yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaa.....im really not sure if i buy the whole DAWs sounding different theory. There are standards that they all must make to stay fiscally competitive and the settings must be up to par for professional studio usage, so it doesn't seem to make sense that there would be sonically noticeable discrepancies (unless there are settings that the user has made or neglected).

however, I'm not callin anybody a bullshitter. I'd be heavily interested in know the cold facts about this debate. But i think the argument is similar to cats who are constantly trying to blind-ear-test certain VST's vs. Analog synths.

When Sev talked about the other Beat Forum, what I found really kind of confusing was: a lot of activity talking about production techniques while at the same times the flips were kinda weak. I'm still tryin' to wrap my head around this discrepancy - but that's another story…

But anyway: I was kinda feeling the same way about glimpses into the actual technical efforts that are made during the production phase. So since STBB 283 I started to add "Liner Notes" in the track descriptions at Soundcloud, where I break down the whole track. It's my kind of wayback nostalgia of reading booklets - except that's it's more like for us creators. The only setback about this is, that you actually have to click the Link of the current track to read 'em - they won't be displayed on the STBB Group page. So it would be nice to have a thread like that.

Yes Sev dam good idea, find out how DJ Sapien makes a beat on a plane!!sometimes I really want feedback, and you will get, dope bass, nice drop, it's cool, but sometimes I post my battle beat go to work come back and listen and think O shit! that really is crap, for example the remix of S.F.T's brothers tune I was quite happy with, really listen too it and it's crap, but it got 80 odd plays, sometimes you know you've dropped a bomb and it gets slept on, doesn't even get a mention, I've noticed this with a lot of beats, take Ogi feel the beat how the hell has he not won a battle yet. Do we see no comments and assume something is not very good and skip it, I know I have been guilty!! this makes me wanna get better and push others as well.

Feel you on this one hunnid, BUT I guess, this phenomenon refers more to social dynamics and behavorial aspects, rather than production techniques and therefore cannot be changed by a thread about production technique breakdowns, I guess.

Since I became aware about social aspects like that, I try to listen to ANY single beat and total rely on my own judgement and then decide, who I run with. Sometimes it is also about timing: when did you post the beat and who posted before and after you. there's a good chance, that your or my beat will sound kinda lame, if enzo, ogi, oso, ghprod and so on dropped before you and you are in direct comparison to them.

Even more important: who samples the most obvious part or phrase without killing it, won't win. Period. Because in 9 Times out of ten, people who win, win because they make you say: goddamn, how the fuck did he do this - was this even in there? (besides the fact, that it's mixed well and just sound either really fat and professional or just grimey and dirty in a good way - it's all about the balance).

Furthermore the fact, that there are like 60 other people who do the same shit, won't let you win either. If I listen to 10 beats and 8 of them start of with the same chop/phrase element - I will probably strictly skip the shit. Except the case, when I can definitely hear a certain idea going on in the track, where the beat maker simply is not "there" yet in terms of skills, to really bring it to life sonically, I just leave comment to encourage him. Cause we all need that. On the other hand, you do not want to offend anybody either. So people rather not say anything than criticizing somebody. It's that "If you don't have to say something nice, don't say anything at all" mentality.

This is just to exemplify that there are more important aspects in the social sphere that surround the actual beat that have to be taken into account than just the beat alone. If you have been recognized as a dope producer and are constantly dropping dope shit and built a fanbase of some sort, there is a good chance, people will vote for you beat, although this might not be THE ONE.

In the end, I guess you just have to reach a level of self confidence, where you can be like: eff y'all I KNOW I KILLED IT, no matter what you think, without being just ignorant - cause no one votes for ignorant assholes… some people in Miami did it somehow and that didn't really worked out so well…, see I'm getting OT here now in an a-hole fashion. You don't want to do THAT!

Feel you on this one hunnid, BUT I guess, this phenomenon refers more to social dynamics and behavorial aspects, rather than production techniques and therefore cannot be changed by a thread about production technique breakdowns, I guess.

Since I became aware about social aspects like that, I try to listen to ANY single beat and total rely on my own judgement and then decide, who I run with. Sometimes it is also about timing: when did you post the beat and who posted before and after you. there's a good chance, that your or my beat will sound kinda lame, if enzo, ogi, oso, ghprod and so on dropped before you and you are in direct comparison to them.

Even more important: who samples the most obvious part or phrase without killing it, won't win. Period. Because in 9 Times out of ten, people who win, win because they make you say: goddamn, how the fuck did he do this - was this even in there? (besides the fact, that it's mixed well and just sound either really fat and professional or just grimey and dirty in a good way - it's all about the balance).

Furthermore the fact, that there are like 60 other people who do the same shit, won't let you win either. If I listen to 10 beats and 8 of them start of with the same chop/phrase element - I will probably strictly skip the shit. Except the case, when I can definitely hear a certain idea going on in the track, where the beat maker simply is not "there" yet in terms of skills, to really bring it to life sonically, I just leave comment to encourage him. Cause we all need that. On the other hand, you do not want to offend anybody either. So people rather not say anything than criticizing somebody. It's that "If you don't have to say something nice, don't say anything at all" mentality.

This is just to exemplify that there are more important aspects in the social sphere that surround the actual beat that have to be taken into account than just the beat alone. If you have been recognized as a dope producer and are constantly dropping dope shit and built a fanbase of some sort, there is a good chance, people will vote for you beat, although this might not be THE ONE.

In the end, I guess you just have to reach a level of self confidence, where you can be like: eff y'all I KNOW I KILLED IT, no matter what you think, without being just ignorant - cause no one votes for ignorant assholes… some people in Miami did it somehow and that didn't really worked out so well…, see I'm getting OT here now in an a-hole fashion. You don't want to do THAT!

PEACE

I had to quote this incase you go back and delete it cause this is an awesome read especially regarding the social dynamics on soundcloud. Recently this young beat maker asked me how do I get more popular on soundcloud how do I get more exposure and more followers.. fml. My feelings are that if you're a beat maker you should focus on perfecting your craft rather than worrying about popularity etc. I'd say 7 or 8 times out of 10 the product will attract a following but as mentioned above the social dynamics aspect has to be taken in to consideration. Followers mean nothing unless youre able to interact with them and SC has a whole lot of people who are happy to follow u expecting a follow back.

Your point about sampling rings true with me. Beats that firstly sound dope and secondly make you think 'wtf how'd they do that?' are usually the ones that appeal to me. But knowing that someone is happy to receive feedback is good cause im always happy to provide constructive criticism for the purpose of helping them improve. Although its kind of subjective as what I think is dope/sounds good will differ slightly to what others think.

I suggest people watch tutorials. I think your ability to make a good beat is limited to your knowledge of your tools. The better you know your DAW the more you can do with it. So yeah, tutorials are a great source to help you improve. I got a playlist of ableton stuff that I use if anyones interested.

o snap this thread is taking a turn, there is def a social dynamic on the cloud but the stbb group is pretty forgiving, u can tell that by the fact that i"m still around my mixing is horrible and people sooner just pass my track rather than just blast on it and thats cool but i could learn from some criticism , iread steezo do a breakdown about how he does his voting process i kinda use a iron chef judging system u know taste, plating, and creativity always comparing music to food but u simply cant expect cats that make high grade tracks to just oneday slow their roll survival of the fittest but sometimes i wonder if peeps remember stones throw would put out some oddball shit sometimes like captain funkaho , or gary wilson anyways i should come back with a production question! shootz

yeah your vids were informative sft esp in a sea of ableton tutorials on how to make a "hard" beat or a wonky wobble synth so word up to u for that ableton kinda funny tho ifeel u can achieve the same thing in dif ways alot of times, and it seem some of yr production tools aid in speeding up yr work flow and for a min it was like an ableton campaign in here i like ablton but it takes a bit to get into the layout just like any DAW i mean constobuz uses fl and that kinda blows my mind cuz i never got used to the layout on there so i never went back

Yeah if people like what they see on ableton than cool its worth experimenting with it to see what its like. You prob won't know what youre doing until a few months, depending on how committed you are to learning it. But I would highly discourage people from simply switching because of what they have seen on a video. I agree - you prob can achieve the same thing on other DAWS. Like I mentioned before the better you know your tools the more able you are to be creative with it.
I used to use FL and would have stuck with it if my PC hadn't died. Ended up having to learn Ableton as I only have a mac. Took me a while but once I started getting the hang on of it I figured how to use to to do the same things I was doing on FL..

I agree with SFT about soundcloud comments meaning nothing if you can't interact, however, in the spirit of keeping it real, im more attracted to pages that are thick with comments than those that aren't. and even that changes. Its all love, but for instance, Handbook. He makes ok beats, but I used to wonder if his skill warranted the type of numbers he gets. I thought it might be because i was missing information about his live shows that ive never seen or something, or idk. I've since realized that a large percentage of his success is probably due to his amazing grind for commenting and interacting with his fanbase. With that said, since I posted my beat "Slow Motion Photosynthesis" for battle 283, my soundcloud says that my comments, favorites, and plays are up 2700%, 4100% and 1139% in the month of August. I will say this. the new rise in attention has me making some of the best shit ever. So I do think that comments are important in that respect. Another big culprit is that I am starting to use soundcloud as more of a social network, in the same way i use facebook. in fact I use soundcloud more than facebook now, and the sense of community is beginning to be evident on my page, people are going back to beats I did a year ago and showing love.

I have heard bad things about politicking that goes down in these beat battles and that was one reason why i was reluctant to join. I heard that you gotta basically derb the board to get love. However, I have only posted two beats, and my 2nd entry grabbed a tie for second place this past week. So that myth has been debunked in my opinion. It is truly, truly, based on originality and wow factor and that is it. It might sound unfair, but it isnt crazy to use the # comments as a barometer imo (unless your knxwledge lol...oops...#didISaythatOutloud)..but in the context of the battles, we are all good beat makers here. some of the best cats in the world are in here and the production community is made much smaller by this forum. We know which beats are hot and we will comment on them, for the most part. I just wish more non-beatmakers got involved

as for criticism, I think its good practice to critique beats that you might not otherwise vote for. I should work on that myself, cuz i have alot to say, im sure everybody has gathered that i am a talker

6.5 is a full DAW. Completely integrated audio recording and sampling, a new mixer, 3 new effects modules, and open source VST support. The only downside, if it is one, is that the "VSTs" are reason only and your favorite weird ass plug in that you dug up in some dusty, dark part of the web probably wont be made for it.

I suggest people watch tutorials. I think your ability to make a good beat is limited to your knowledge of your tools. The better you know your DAW the more you can do with it. So yeah, tutorials are a great source to help you improve. I got a playlist of ableton stuff that I use if anyones interested.

Yo im definitely interested in that playlist. Enjoyed the breakdown of your beat from last week.Would like to see more of that - i find i learn a lot from videos. Its nice to find videoes where you can compare directly to a beat.

When it comes to DAW vs DAW i think its important to find what fits your needs. i used to use FL, but felt stuck. Got a long period with no music production. Switched over to ableton just for fun - read some good stuff about it. And ive never looked back. It fits myneeds so well.

Concerning soundcloud and voting, i found it hard to listen to all beats during the week. Got a lot going on right now and i dont like voting if i havent listened to all beats. But i too find myself skipping some beats i dont find that cool. Altough i DONT skip beats with few comments or whatever - I havnt got so many comments myself and i would hate it for people to skip my beats.

During my time on soundcloud - a few months - I have gotten about 3 constructive comments. I would love more. Pinpoints what you can work on more. You know - "I feel the drums are to tight and chopped. Loved the sampling though"

True that, i think we all can agree. not that we want to hear shit like: "yo, that shit's whack, quit it." we want to hear: " hey, its nice, but your x was off and your y wasnt loud enough, etc."

Co-sign on that. Problem is: I want to hear that kind of constructive criticism on my beats but I feel uncomfortable tellin' someone what's wrong with his beats when my own shit does not satisfy. I'm makin' beats for like a year and half while a lot of people participating in this battle are doin' this since 5, 6 or even more years. I feel like a greenhorn, you know what I mean?So what I'm sayin' is, the experienced cats need to help the younger and inexperienced dudes, the "old" teach the "young" (man, this sounds kind of selfish, but I hope y'all understand)

Yes Sev dam good idea, find out how DJ Sapien makes a beat on a plane!!sometimes I really want feedback, and you will get, dope bass, nice drop, it's cool, but sometimes I post my battle beat go to work come back and listen and think O shit! that really is crap, for example the remix of S.F.T's brothers tune I was quite happy with, really listen too it and it's crap, but it got 80 odd plays, sometimes you know you've dropped a bomb and it gets slept on, doesn't even get a mention, I've noticed this with a lot of beats, take Ogi feel the beat how the hell has he not won a battle yet. Do we see no comments and assume something is not very good and skip it, I know I have been guilty!! this makes me wanna get better and push others as well.

Good headphones, bruh.

Great thread Sev. I pretty much use the same techniques all the time and would love to learn some new stuff.

Love to learn new techniques! I'd find it very interesting if people tell what filters or synths they used on a particular track. I think that sharing this knowledge will only improve the overall skill level of the battles. Aside to this is the quality of the sound in the mixes. I think that (just like me) a lot of people don't have the big studio-gear.. Tips on eq'ing and getting those drums popping would also be very helpfull. Great idea this topic!

it's called "the crates", that forum already exists. it's the deadest forum on this board, it's actually hella sad. it'll go days without a single post, and 90% of the posts it actually sees are hype spam

it's called "the crates", that forum already exists. it's the deadest forum on this board, it's actually hella sad. it'll go days without a single post, and 90% of the posts it actually sees are hype spam

so LET'S REVIVE THE CRATES!!!! WHOS WITH ME??????

The idea of this new thread is to be focused on the battles though. shouldn't have to go to the crates to find the battle techniques for that specific week. Plus, with this technique, it makes itself pretty immune to people's self-promotion. especially if the self-promotion is encouraged, i.e, "please promote to us your beat and the way you flipped it"

the phrases "sound homogenization" and "style biting" instantly pop into my head when i read this thread.

stonesthrow beat college

It sounds good in theory...we'll see how it turns out, i just never seen a 10 minute flying lotus video where he breaks down his method is all.

technique and sound are two different things. Everybody and their moms has bit Fly Lo but I bet you can always tell the difference between his beats and an imitator. Its because he has the intellect to create. A plumber could give you every tool in his box but what would you know about fixing somebody's toilet? nothing, probably.

the idea is to share techniques that can help further someones understanding of music production, not literally a style donation thread.

as for the Fly lo thing...maybe not a video. hes generally a low key guy from my understanding. but you're sleeping if you haven't read any interview where he talks about his gear or his technique in an interview

you're right about the plumber/tools thing, but creating a video that chronicles the exact method used in something is like a magician revealing his tricks and in a way, it's impossible to separate technique from style. with out technique A, style A might not exist.

to me, method and process IS art. perhaps im just old fashioned and still like the small amount of mystery and aura that surrounds art work that isn't my own, the process of discovery and the immense rewards of self education.

of course, everyone has to start somewhere, or discover something new to get out of a rut...... *warning hella rap game bitterness* but im not a fan of people who have never even participated in one battle swoopin on battler's techniques and diluting a music genre thats already like cheap diner ranch dressing. but on the flip side perhaps a thing like this will push the genre forward in some unknown way.

in any event, it's fun to think about and hear others thoughts on the subject itself

you're right about the plumber/tools thing, but creating a video that chronicles the exact method used in something is like a magician revealing his tricks and in a way, it's impossible to separate technique from style. with out technique A, style A might not exist.

to me, method and process IS art. perhaps im just old fashioned and still like the small amount of mystery and aura that surrounds art work that isn't my own, the process of discovery and the immense rewards of self education.

lol oh i agree. Believe me, the smart beatmakers who make videos will definitely hold back the key ingredients. biters wont even realize what they are missing unless they tried to recreate it and couldn't. like, for instance...the illest part of SFT's beat i thought was the arrangement....that part was omitted and probably for good reason. so yea...+1. hopefully people will have the smarts to remember to keep some of the jewels in the MPC, away from the threads

Feel you on this one hunnid, BUT I guess, this phenomenon refers more to social dynamics and behavorial aspects, rather than production techniques and therefore cannot be changed by a thread about production technique breakdowns, I guess.

Since I became aware about social aspects like that, I try to listen to ANY single beat and total rely on my own judgement and then decide, who I run with. Sometimes it is also about timing: when did you post the beat and who posted before and after you. there's a good chance, that your or my beat will sound kinda lame, if enzo, ogi, oso, ghprod and so on dropped before you and you are in direct comparison to them.

Even more important: who samples the most obvious part or phrase without killing it, won't win. Period. Because in 9 Times out of ten, people who win, win because they make you say: goddamn, how the fuck did he do this - was this even in there? (besides the fact, that it's mixed well and just sound either really fat and professional or just grimey and dirty in a good way - it's all about the balance).

Furthermore the fact, that there are like 60 other people who do the same shit, won't let you win either. If I listen to 10 beats and 8 of them start of with the same chop/phrase element - I will probably strictly skip the shit. Except the case, when I can definitely hear a certain idea going on in the track, where the beat maker simply is not "there" yet in terms of skills, to really bring it to life sonically, I just leave comment to encourage him. Cause we all need that. On the other hand, you do not want to offend anybody either. So people rather not say anything than criticizing somebody. It's that "If you don't have to say something nice, don't say anything at all" mentality.

This is just to exemplify that there are more important aspects in the social sphere that surround the actual beat that have to be taken into account than just the beat alone. If you have been recognized as a dope producer and are constantly dropping dope shit and built a fanbase of some sort, there is a good chance, people will vote for you beat, although this might not be THE ONE.

In the end, I guess you just have to reach a level of self confidence, where you can be like: eff y'all I KNOW I KILLED IT, no matter what you think, without being just ignorant - cause no one votes for ignorant assholes… some people in Miami did it somehow and that didn't really worked out so well…, see I'm getting OT here now in an a-hole fashion. You don't want to do THAT!

PEACE

Ooops look what I bloody started get what ya saying, completely, think it is definitely time to evolve as people ourselves, we all need to know how to express from within, Id rather evolve as part of a community than worry about being the best in the world, there is only difference, I'd also like to see the younger ones being able too ask questions without feeling got at, and know they can learn something new, without the old wrestlers tactic of hiding certain tricks, I want kids to make sick beats and they ain't gonna find out, with misguiding vids that tell you too boost a certain frequency when you know it's a painfull one to put upon people. Got to come from the angle of respect and honesty, (not saying your not, just saying how it should be cos I said so!! ha ha!)